The Mayan Codex

60

‘Do you think we’re crazy doing this? I mean, we’re standing here in a foreign country, at night, on a protected archaeological site, destroying one of their ancient monuments. If they catch us at it, they’ll toss us into prison and throw away the key.’ Sabir’s face had taken on a livid tinge in the moonlight – he did, indeed, look half mad.

‘We’re putting the stones back, Sabir. Nobody will know the difference.’

Calque and Sabir were onto the third of the marked masks. Each time they succeeded in levering one of the stone masks partially out of its sconce, one of them would hold the torch while the other felt around in the space behind the mask, pretending not to be worried about scorpions, biting spiders, and snakes.

‘Maybe Mexico doesn’t have scorpions?’

‘Of course they do. They’re strictly nocturnal creatures, though. And they only get angry when disturbed.’

‘Thank you, Calque. Thank you very much indeed.’ Sabir was feeling around behind one of the sconces with his hand. ‘They’re not deadly, are they?’

‘Just the Centruroides. The rest are okay.’

Sabir snatched his hand out of the hole. ‘Nothing there.’ He shivered, as if someone had just walked over his grave. ‘Where the heck do you come up with this sort of information, Calque? Do you just gen up for the fun of it? Or is it a nervous tic?’

‘Yes to both.’

‘You’re doing the next hole, then.’ Sabir’s cell phone buzzed. He slapped at his pocket as if he thought there might be a scorpion lurking in there too. ‘Yeah?’ He listened. Then he nodded. ‘Okay. Thanks. We’re fine here. No luck yet. Three to go. Then we can all go back home and have a holiday. The Caribbean, preferably. I’ve already got the double-hammock and the rum punches lined up. And there are no scorpions over there to leap out at you.’ Sabir pocketed the cell phone and turned to Calque. ‘Lamia says the roads in each direction are clear. She’ll continue to run interference for us until we call her in.’

‘The Caribbean is full of scorpions. You really are an ignorant man, Sabir.’

Sabir pointed at him. ‘Okay then, how’s this for ignorant? The Maya write from left to right, just like us. Except that everything’s in pairs with them. Glyph blocks, and suchlike. You told me that yourself, didn’t you?’

Calque gave a cautious nod.

‘What if we miss out the next section and just start at the far corner, which we probably should have done in the first place? Not waste our time here pussyfooting around on the right. In fact, why don’t we treat this whole temple wall as if it’s the stone equivalent of a written parchment?’

‘Why not just toss a coin?’ Calque sighed. ‘If your theory is right, Sabir, we have been wasting our time looking behind the wrong stones. We have been counting the twentieth mask from the right in each of these sections. If we had followed Maya practice, we ought to have counted the twentieth stone from the left. And started from the top. Is this what you are saying?’

‘My point exactly. Only I’m a stupid idiot who doesn’t know there are scorpions all over the Caribbean.’

‘It was a joke, Sabir. If a man is really secure in his intelligence, he doesn’t need to lash out whenever anyone teases him.’

Sabir was only slightly mollified. ‘Okay. I’m sorry.’

‘I’m sorry too. And I’m even sorrier that your theory, much as it pains me to admit it, seems a good one. Let’s go straight to the twentieth mask from the left.’

‘What forfeit will you pay me if I’m right?’

Calque sighed. His face took on the expression of a cartoon dog being forced to placate an over-bumptious puppy. ‘I’ll speak up for you with Lamia whenever she asks me about you. Which she does, incidentally, nearly all the time. How would that be? Previously I’ve always tried to drop you in it on account of my sexual jealousy. But from now on I’ll praise you to the skies. Will that satisfy you?’

‘It’s a deal.’

‘Of course, if we don’t find whatever it is we’re looking for, I will still consider myself free to undermine you at every opportunity.’

Sabir shook his head. ‘Thank God you’re French and not Belgian, Calque. Otherwise I might have a real problem with your sense of humour.’